State of the Schools Report

The annual State of the Schools Report provides information and data about Nebraska public schools and student performance.

The report highlights the performance of students by district and school building in reading, mathematics, writing, and science as well as the performance by groups of students, including race and ethnicity, poverty, special education, and English Language Learners.

This year the report includes the final year for the current form of Nebraska Performance Accountability System (NePAS) results. NePAS ranks school districts by status, improvement, growth, and graduation rates. Beginning next year, the SOSR will include a redesigned NePAS as part of the AQuESTT model and will place all schools and districts in one of four classification levels.

The following chart shows the number of school districts demonstrating improvement and growth based on the two most recent years of data. When two years of scale score data were compared, the majority of districts demonstrated improvement as well as positive growth, as reflected in the counts below. However, some districts had negative growth. Zero (0) is comparable to one year of learning for a student.

Rankings

READING

MATHEMATICS

SCIENCE

Improvement

186 of 248 districts

162 of 248 districts

131 of 248 districts

Growth

203 of 248 districts

153 of 248 districts

The overarching goal of Nebraska is college and career ready students when they graduate from high school as a basis for a successful work, military and/or college experience.

The Nebraska accountability system is intended to help inform policy makers, the public, and school officials about school district performance. This report is also intended to inform parents, community leaders, and policymakers about our education system and to provide data needed for sound decision-making by education policymakers.

As you review this report, please note that school districts are ranked on a number of factors. Comprehensive information and multiple measures about our schools are critical to sound decision making. We discourage using any one ranking to make a judgment about any district just as we discourage using one test score to make a judgment about any one student. As always, your school district officials can best explain their data and how it applies to their district.

Please take time to study the report and learn how the schools and students in your community are performing. I encourage you to talk to your local school officials about the results and the needs of students. We encourage parents to talk to the teachers of their children, who are most knowledgeable about their performance.

Thank you,

Matt BlomstedtCommissioner of Education

Scott SwisherDeputy Commissioner of Education

State Board of Education Lillie Larsen, District 1 Glen Flint, District 2 Rachel Wise, District 3 John Witzel, District 4 Patricia Timm, District 5 Molly O'Holleran, District 7 John Sieler, District 8

Overcast

Location:

Grant

Feels like:

23&deg

Humidity:

96

Wind:

NW 16 mph

33°

Today

A chance of snow before noon, then a chance of rain and snow between noon and 2pm, then a chance of rain after 2pm. Patchy blowing snow before 11am. Cloudy, with a high near 39. Breezy, with a north wind around 20 mph, with gusts as high as 30 mph. Chance of precipitation is 50%.

Tonight

Partly cloudy, with a low around 21. North wind 10 to 15 mph becoming north northwest 5 to 10 mph after midnight. Winds could gust as high as 25 mph.

Tuesday

Mostly sunny, with a high near 52. Northwest wind 5 to 15 mph, with gusts as high as 20 mph.